Halloween Day: My Truck, My Tablet, and a Pink House

I called truck #212221 'Desirae'. Google tells me this is a French name for "the one desired". I found a poster of Ray Lewis propped against a pump-canister in the back of the flat-faced Isuzu my manager assigned to me: perhaps a desire but even more a discovery. "I'll call you 'Rae-Rae'-- short for Desirae."…

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Halloween Day: The Costumed Clerk and a Plastic Trumpet

On Halloween Day I departed from the IHOP in Olney, MD in a daze. To lessen the likelihood of mowing-down trick-or-treaters with our fleet of half-blind utility trucks, our assigned work orders were lighter that day. I had spent the morning disguised as a lawn technician, and employed as one this past Autumn, but never shed…

It’s Like Warm Caramel

I cried unexpectedly when I read Kamasi Washington’s liner-notes for “Harmony of Difference”. I found the suite while browsing for “Heaven & Earth” on Amazon.com and ordered both sent to my father’s house in Holland, MI. Absconding to a chair in a blind corner, I quieted too fast and my father came looking for me,…

‘Parable of the Crime Duos’ & Comments on a SCOTUS Nominee

I begin with a parable: Two sh'baab (young fellows*) boosted a $77,000 automobile. One was impoverished and planned to benefit from chopping the car for parts, the other came for the adventure of stealing and driving. They were apprehended with no damage done to the vehicle. By miraculous luck, the two were brought before the…

Write to Live: Orange Hyundai

With thanks to "Classy Cars" https://bit.ly/2uJhSorA familiar vehicle paused next to my Pontiac as I lingered at the traffic-light where MD-650 crosses MD-198. From the open window of a burnt-orange Veloster, a hand dangled with a cigarette pinched between two fingers. Full recognition came a second later: it was my ex-girlfriend's ex-husband. The confluences that…

Write to Live: Green Torches

When I was eighteen, I wrote a short-story based on a nightmare. I fled a large man with a sword in and out of doorways, through tunnels, up ladders onto scaffolds (and jumping down again), in an endless maze. The fiction has a distinct beginning and an ending. The story evolved to include a cell,…

IHOP ‘Max Tomato’, ‘Hyperbolic Time-Chambers’, and my Dani…

Blogging at its truest: I "process-wrote" at Starbucks for over three hours. I'm accepting this. I have a novel pitch for readers to respond to but first I need to do some reflection -- something 'normal' preceding a BIG lump of weird. Inspiration is a powerful reason to live. I want to be inspired and…